


taako fights a necromancy cult on candlenights

by taakofromtaz (octolingkiera)



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Candlenights, Gen, TAAKO DOES A HIT, but he's not bc i can't write him, hopefully accurate use of d&d spells, kravitz was supposed to be here, sorry I don't make the rules - Freeform, taako's a badass okay, the blupjeans is just background stuff, there's a little violence here but nothing more graphic than canon stuff, very little to do with candlenights actually
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-31
Updated: 2017-12-31
Packaged: 2019-02-24 14:52:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13216131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/octolingkiera/pseuds/taakofromtaz
Summary: (alternately titled "how the necromancers stealing lup made the best candlenights ever")“Really, fellas? On Candlenights? Don’t you have anything better to do?”





	taako fights a necromancy cult on candlenights

**Author's Note:**

> big thanks to the taz fic writers discord for giving me the initial idea and cheering me on!!!
> 
> this isn't my best work but i just wanted to post it before the year ended,
> 
> i did a little TOO much d&d spell research bc i love accuracy,  
> also, hopefully these spells are all ones taako can actually use,
> 
> happy candlenights and happy new year's!!!!

Tonight is going to absolutely perfect. Taako has spent the day toiling away in the kitchen—with the occasional help from Lup—to make the family dinner absolutely perfect. Everyone’s favorite dishes are present and even the latest of guests are set to arrive several hours before it’s time to chow down.

Lup and Barry and Kravitz have been in and out of their office in the Astral Plane the last couple days to finish any last night work that would even slightly disrupt their family holiday. There shouldn’t be any bounties coming their way for the next few days at this rate, Istus and the Raven Queen forbid.

Candlenights is going to be beyond perfect this year.

Lup is the first one home and after checking in with Taako in the kitchen, rushes off to her room to gussy up for the evening. Once she’s done, Taako will get ready, and by that point, the boys should be done wrapping up their paperwork and be back in time to help greet the first guests.

Taako is halfway out of the kitchen when a dimensional rift opens up beside Lup and Barry steps through, looking a little exhausted. “Just in time, Barold,” he says, smiling when Lup turns to give him a kiss. “Keep my sister company while I get ready, huh?”

Barry blushes and wraps an arm around Lup’s waist. “Heh. Not a proble—” Before he can finish, Lup disappears from his grasp, and the two of them are left staring at where she was in complete shock.

“ _What the fuck_?” Taako rushes back into the room and waves an arm where Lup was standing just a second ago.

“L-Lup? What happened?” Barry’s eyes are blown wide behind his glasses and he’s frozen in place, shoulders stiff and arm slowly drifting back to this side.

“Barold!” Taako thumps him in the chest and Barry sucks in a deep breath, coming back to himself. “Come with me. I have a silver mirror in my room.”

“R-right. Right. We—we’ll find her. It’s okay, it’s fine.” Barry’s rambling seems to be more for his own comfort than anything, so Taako snatches up his wrist and drags him down to hall and into his disaster of a room. He shoves Barry to down to take a seat on the bed and digs around on top of the dresser for the silver hand mirror he knows he has.

Taako sets the mirror on the bed beside Barry and takes Barry’s face in his hands. “Hey,” he says, ducking his head to took him in the eyes, voice low. “We’ll find her. She didn’t leave.” The _this time_ is implied. “She wouldn’t do that.” _Not again_.

Barry sighs and closes his eyes. Taako leans in and plants a kiss on his forehead. “What’s the plan, Taako?”

“I’m gonna cast Scrying. See if I can find her,” Taako says, stepping away and scooping the mirror back up. He clears a spot on the floor and sits down, cross legged, and focuses on the mirror. “I need you to go find her brush and bring me a piece of her hair. That’s the easiest way to do it.”

Barry nods and leaves the room. Taako closes his eyes and focuses directly on Lup, thinks about her laugh, her smile, the way she looks, the way she talks, and wills his magic to focus on hers. His ear flicks when Barry comes back, Lup’s brush in his hands. Taako takes it silently and concentrates the spell through it with one hand and the mirror with the other.

It takes a minute for the spell to find her, but it finally catches and he can see her in his mind’s eye quite clearly. There’s no way Lup knew he was going to look for her, but he can feel her voluntarily failing her save regardless. A second later, the room around him fades and he feels as if he’s with Lup, wherever she is.

Taako looks around, seeing and hearing through the scrying spell’s invisible sensor, and says, “Barry, if you can hear me, I found her. I’m gonna tell you what this place looks like.”

Taako can’t hear if Barry makes any sort of reply, but he feels a warm hand settle on his shoulder so he figures that the words came through. (Taako’s only ever used this spell once and he was alone when he used it, holed up in his room and getting drunk by turning water into wine like fantasy Jesus while he tried to find the man that wanted to kill him so bad he almost succeeded. He has no idea what it looks like from the outside or even if anything he said would come through. He’s glad that it does; trying to remember what this place looks like would be hell.)

The cave is dark and musty and full of weird, vaguely creepy artefacts that Taako doesn’t feel like describing. Bones and skulls of all sorts litter the floors and from Taako’s position, he can see Lup standing in the middle of a summoning circle, red cloak draped over her little black dress, arms crossed and looking extremely put out.

“Really, fellas? On Candlenights? Don’t you have anything better to do?” She sounds annoyed and not worried at all and Taako can’t help but feel relieved. “Didn’t we have to come break your shit up _literally_ a week ago?”

That might be useful. Taako doesn’t know if Lup is being helpful on purpose, but he relates the info to Barry regardless. The hand leaves his shoulder and Taako tries to moves to catch it and only ends up moving his field of vision. Attempting to pull out of the spell only leaves him with a headache and ringing ears. “Barry? Where’d you go?”

The necromancers surrounding Lup say nothing, and she just looks progressively more annoyed. “So what now? You bring me all the way here and… nothing? No reaction?”

The necromancers start murmuring amongst themselves in Abyssal and Taako tunes them out, still trying to abort the Scrying spell before its ten minutes are up. The problem is that he doesn’t know how. His first attempt hadn’t been a success.

“Barry! Get back here!” Taako calls out, trying to move again. His vision merely shifts and he huffs out a breath, trying to stay calm. Nothing good comes from panic and his usual grounding methods are useless if he can’t move his physical body. “I’m about to freak the fuck out, Barry! Where’d you go?”

Nothing. Taako closes his mind to the vision of the inside of the cave and counts his heartbeats as he waits for the spell to end.

He hears the sound of fabric tearing and he opens his mind’s eye to see Barry step out of the rift, his Reaper glamor making him look like his lich form. “Asshole!” Taako screams, vision swinging as he makes to throw his arms out.

“Hey, babe!” Lup says, a huge smile lighting up her face. Taako wants to do a hit on Barry’s stupid face. “How’d you know I’d be here?”

Barry looks around, pulls something from his robe, and taps two fingers to the sides of his glasses. He sweeps the room again and locks eyes with what Taako can only assume is the Scrying spell’s sensor. “Huh. Neat.”

Taako huffs as Lup tilts her head. “What is it?” The necromancers are chanting now, something Taako is oblivious to the meaning of, but given the circumstances, it can’t be anything good.

“Taako found you with a spell. He can see us right now actually. Hears us too.” Barry gestures in the direction the sensor. Taako just wishes the spell would end already.

“Shit yeah!” Lup turns and smiles blindly in his direction. “Hey, Koko! These necro-fucks are real close to home! You know that cave that you, me, and Bare-bare checked out a few months ago? I think this is it!” Taako smiles even though she can’t see him. Lup is the _best_.

Barry sighs. “This is exactly what I was trying to avoid. We got this covered.”

“Aww, but it’s _Candlenights!_ ” Lup says at the same time that Taako yells out, “Suck it, Barry!” to his empty room.

“You two are chaos inca—” Whatever Barry was going to say is cut off the spell ending, throwing Taako back into his own senses and his quiet room.

“Lulu you’re the best sister ever,” Taako says to himself as he scrambles to his feet. He runs into the kitchen first thing and turns off all the heat he can and moves the dishes to safer, less fire-hazardous spots. (That could have been a disaster.) The next thing he does is jot down a note for Kravitz— “We had a situation but we’re handling it!” —and then he rushes back to his room for his cloak and component bag and the Krebstar.

It’s time to fuck up some necromancers.

 

It takes Taako about ten minutes on Garyl to find the exact cave Lup and Barry are in. Taako doesn’t bother dispelling the phantom steed and as long as he stays out of the way, he should be fine. “Go in there and kick some ass, my man,” the binicorn drawls, voice low and smooth.

Taako shoots him finger guns and takes off into the cave, trying his best to be quick but quiet. The cave is suspiciously silent and Taako can’t imagine it means anything good for his family. Ahead of him, the cave opens up into an antechamber that’s lit with an assortment of candles an few enchanted lanterns.

There’s about a dozen hooded figures of varying shapes and sizes standing in a semicircle around where Taako can recognize as the last place he saw Lup. She and Barry are pressed back to back, hands clenched together, surrounded by what appears to be spectral cuffs. Lup’s mouth is moving but there’s no sound and Taako, if he’s being completely honest with himself, doesn’t care enough about the why to figure it out.

Conclusion? Lup and Barry are pretty soundly—or not, heh—trapped. No big deal.

The smart thing to do is try to pick these dudes off one by one and find a way to free Barry and Lup from the trap. The smart thing to do is to try and rescue his family and have them help him kick some ass.

What Taako ends up doing is firing off the most potent Sunbeam he can, taking special care to avoid catching Lup and Barry in its line of fire. Over half the necromancers fail their save and scream as the spell blinds them temporarily. The rest fall away from the line as quickly as they can. Not a single one of them is left unharmed.

“Just who the _fuck_ do you think you are?” Taako steps out from his hiding spot, Krebstar raised, face drawn into a snarl. The necromancers left with their vision—about four of them, Taako guesses—look at him in what can only be stunned silence. “ _Really, fellas_?” Taako asks, copying Lup’s line because it was just that good. “On _Candlenights_?”

“Run along, little wizard,” the nearest necromancer hisses at him, their voice low and grating. “You’re not who we want.”

Taako scoffs and hardens his glare. _Little wizard_? Sure, he must be a sight to behold with this hair in a messy bun, an apron thrown over and oversized sweaters with the sleeves rolled up, sweatpants and boots that are a size too big—not to mention his cloak of the manta ray and belt with his spell component pouch—but just because he looks like hot garbage right now doesn’t mean he’s not capable.

He’ll show these fuckers what for. They deserve it for underestimating him.

Taako gives a nasty smirk to the necromancer that spoke and aims the tip of the Krebstar at them. “Watch this,” he says, the casts Disintegrate.

The necromancer shrieks, briefly, and falls apart before the remaining hooded figures can make a move to stop him. Taako adjusts his grip. “Anyone else?”

A couple of the blinded necromancers fall over their comrades trying to move closer to him and one of the relatively unharmed figures raises an arm towards him. Taako quickly steps back into his hiding spot and casts Mislead, sending his double to go running deeper into the cave. He keeps his senses with the double until he’s sure of the path it can take then switches back to himself and sneaks, completely invisible over to Barry and Lup.

Barry’s eyes turn to him immediately and he barely stops himself from making an audible reaction. Stupid Barold and his stupid True Seeing.

Actually, this might be useful.

 _Thank you Istus_ , Taako thinks, raising his hands and signing out, ‘Trap?’

Barry blinks once or twice before grinning. The crew had all learned this sign language of sorts back in Cycle 27 when they came across a plane that left most the nonhuman members of their crew deafened—the cause being something that emitted a planetwide audio tone that only certain races and species were capable of hearing. It obliterated the auditory nerves of anything that could hear it, but the natives of the plane had already begun adapting, mostly by adopting more visual indicators for those affected by the strong noise.

‘Glyph,’ Barry signs out, doing his best to keep his movements small and subtle. Lup shifts against him and squints in Taako’s direction, so Barry shows her the name symbol they came up with for Taako. (Granted, it’s not the one _Taako_ came up with, but the others convinced him that the gesture he wanted was a little too complex and obscure. He reluctantly agreed.)

‘Trap,’ Lup signs, confirming as well, looking off to the side. ‘Rock?’ She ends her second sign with a shrug, trying not to be too obvious about looking for the source of their magic cage.

Taako holds up a single finger, the universal ‘wait a moment,’ and switches his sense back to his double. Said double is deeper into the cave than Taako’s ever been and is physically wrecking every weird artefact it can while still keeping them mostly intact so the Reaper Squad can confiscate them. The double seems to be doing fine, making a mess of things while avoiding the occasional spell being flung his way.

Taako comes back to his actual self to see Lup pointing to a huge boulder close to the cavern wall.

‘Fake?’ she guesses, nudging Barry. He glances back at it and nods.

‘Check,’ Taako signs, sneaking over to the rock. He needs to be quick. The blindness seems to be wearing off of victims of his Sunbeam.

The rock is indeed somewhat fake. The front is illusory, a cover to hide a small, open spellbook covered in glowing arcane runes sitting on a much smaller rock. Taako grabs the book and snaps it closed. He doesn’t particularly care which type of trapping spell this is, but removing the book from the area should be enough to end the spell.

He tosses the book towards the cave entrance and watches as Lup and Barry grin and step away from the center of the summoning circle on the floor.

Taking advantage of his invisibility, Taako nudges past Barry and Lup. “Take a sip, babes,” he says, winking at Barry, and he casts Cone of Cold. Taako fades back into visibility as a vicious, icy wind whips up at his fingertips and blasts through the cave. The closest necromancers, still recovering from their blindness, fail to save—again—and several are frozen solid as their hit points drop to zero.

Lup is cheering, whooping and laughing as her brother annihilates the den of necromancers. Not all of them die from the attack, but enough of them do—Barry moves to collect the souls of the deceased as Lup heads further into the cave to get any stragglers.

Spell over and job done, he casually pretends to dust his hands off and waits for Lup and Barry to finish their reaping.

“Koko! That was fantastic!” Lup calls out as she runs up to him and grabs him in a big hug, lifting him up and spinning him around.

He laughs and hugs her back, striking a showy pose when she sets him back down. “Thank you, thank you, I know I’m amazing.”

“That was really impressive, Taako. Nice work,” Barry says, looking like himself again.

Taako turns to him and gives him a sharp smile. “You’re on thin ice, pal.” His eyes narrow and his grip on the Krebstar shifts. “You know why.”

Barry visibly gulps and Lup laughs. “Sorry I just. Left. Like that. I won’t do it again, promise.”

Rolling his eyes, Taako turns and starts to exit the cave. “Yeah, sure, whatever. I’m going home. This isn’t my job and I have to finish getting ready.” He looks back at them and points at them. “You better be home before seven or I’ll come back here and drag you back _personally_.”

Lup gives him a mock salute. “You got it boss! Come on Bare-bare. I’m sure there’s some gross junk in here that you’d just _love_ to get your hands on.”

Barry waves at him as he shuffles off, following Lup to the cavern room that Taako’s double trashed.

Garyl is still waiting outside when Taako finally leaves the cave. “We done here?” the phantom steed asks as Taako climbs up.

“Yeah m’man. Take me home.”

 

Somehow Taako makes it home before any of the guests arrive, which is just as well because he still has a lot to do. He makes to resume cooking and or reheat the food and rushes back to his room to change as quickly as he can. He comes back to the kitchen to see Lup standing at the stove.

“Go finish getting ready, bro.” She smiles at him. “I got this. Barry when back to the Astral Plane to drop some stuff off and drag your boy toy back home.”

Taako darts forward to peck her cheek with a kiss before running back to his. “Thanks, you’re the best!”

“No problem! And chill out! Tonight’s gonna be _perfect!_ ” Lup laughs after him and he smiles.

Best Candlenights _ever_.

**Author's Note:**

> ending kinda sucks but eh. que sera sera fuckit
> 
> comments and kudos are much appreciated!!!


End file.
